by Dagmara Genda // Jan. 14, 2025
This article is part of our feature topic Cycles.
Vera Kox’s affectionately named “creatures” look like something between industrial pollution—think of the white blobs of polyvinyl acetate that recently washed onto the shores of Canada’s east coast—and extraneous cellular growths developed in a lab. Most often relegated to the clinical interiors of galleries, in 2022 they escaped into the outside world to shelter themselves in fields of long grass, to grow over metal lattices and discover new, welcoming habitats in various shallow bodies of water. But these aren’t living beings; they are ceramic sculptures. What at first glance looks like piles of pliable, fleshy folds is soon betrayed by the occasional crack and brittle edge. They have a particular aura of fragility despite the fact, Kox tells me, that ceramic has a lifespan longer than that of most rocks. Yet a relatively recent shift in her work accommodates a certain level of change, and perhaps, in the future, outright destruction. In this way, her work starts to stand at odds with the accelerating cycles of art, which spin through phases of invention, critique, rejection and back to invention through rediscovery. For at least the last 20 years, these phases have sped up to the warp speed of biennials, fairs and festivals. In using both artificial and natural, not to mention living, materials, Kox envisions an art production in the process of unleashing itself from the cycles of trend and history, yearning for the slower movement of geological time.
In a video call from the Cité Internationale des Arts Paris, Kox reflects on the changes in her practice, whose aesthetic hallmarks have often consisted of artificial, industrial materials—things like bright yellow plastic chains, pink bubble wrap, electric blue packing material or bright turquoise polyurethane foam. Though these elements have not entirely disappeared from her work, they have become accents in a growing artistic vocabulary. Using materials such as water, moss and drying clay, Kox increasingly foregrounds her search for accidental discovery and her acceptance of temporality.
Vera Kox: ‘Sentient Soil,’ 2024, installation view at Konschthal Esch // © Christof Weber/Konschthal Esch, courtesy of the artist
Dagmara Genda: Your installations have often featured insulation panels, plastic wrap, styrofoam in many bright, even garish, colours. In ‘Sentient Soil’ at Konschthal Esch and in ‘] Instar [’ at Galleri Opdahl the outside environment, as well as organic and changeable processes, play a dominant role. Can you talk about this shift?
Vera Kox: This shift has been gradual and is tied to my general approach to creating work. My practice has always reflected my immediate surroundings, particularly the environments of large urban centers like Berlin, Paris or London. I was initially drawn to materials and debris that surfaced on sidewalks or in derelict buildings, which often displayed a sense of transformation.
Recently, however, I’ve begun to focus more on peripheral landscapes and processes beyond these urban settings—such as the post-industrial environment of my hometown, Esch/Alzette. I’m interested in the transformative processes shaping our environment and the role we, as humans, play in them. This includes integrating the ecological history and unique characteristics of specific places. For example, in my 2022 work, ‘…into the peripheral, reflecting,’ I placed a large ceramic sculpture on a steel beam that bridged swampy water in the post-industrial setting of Esch’s former steel factories.
Vera Kox: ‘] Instar [,’ 2023 // Copyright Bitmap/Markus Johansson
DG: The title ‘Sentient Soil’ made me think of flat ontologies or even Peter Wohlleben’s claim that trees communicate with one another, and even protect and nurse each other. Do ideas of post-humanism, or simply looking beyond the human as center, play a role in your work?
VK: Absolutely. The idea of post-human ontology—or ecology—is central to the exhibition. However, I wouldn’t limit it to Peter Wohlleben’s perspective. My focus lies in exploring life beyond plant life, toward mineral life forms, which extend biological life to include transformational processes within landscapes—like volcanic activity, and other movement within an environment often perceived as static. I would like to consider forms of life that exist in what we typically consider inert or lifeless matter. This also leads me to acknowledge a responsibility or envision a practice of care for these forms of existence—an idea reflected in the exhibition’s title, ‘Sentient Soil.’
These thoughts also shaped my research into climatically extreme environments that undergo intense processes of transformation, such as the volcanic mineral springs of the Dallol region, in the Ethiopian desert, and in contrast the irreversible melting of the Arctic environment of Spitsbergen, Norway—both in slow but constant movement—which I portray in my video installation ‘fallen material’ (2024). The Ethiopian desert has been particularly fascinating and unsettling to me. As one of the lowest and hottest places on Earth, with incredibly mesmerizing colourful hot springs, it speaks to me of both a potential, looming future—a world shaped by extreme heat and uninhabitable conditions—and a distant past, as “Lucy,” the oldest hominid, was discovered in this region.
Vera Kox: ‘fallen material,’ 2024, video projection onto polyethylene sheets, 12:02 s, loop, sound by Tom Mills, 250×410×210 cm // © Christof Weber/Konschthal Esch, courtesy of the artist
DG: Does thinking through post-humanism also affect your views of artistic authorship?
VK: Rather than authorship, I am interested in leaving space for chance and accidental forms. I want to allow for each material’s agency, its characteristics and tendencies to unfold. It is often a play of control and letting go.
DG: Were there accidents that resulted in works for ‘Sentient Soil’?
VK: Working with ceramics inherently involves unpredictability. The material’s fragility and the lack of control during the firing process are part of its magic. I conduct extensive experiments and research into clay and glazes, but ultimately, it’s always a process of trial and error. Achieving a specific form often requires negotiating with the physical limits of the material—pushing it to see how much it can withstand before it breaks or collapses.
Most of my sculptural forms incorporate accidents. These layered accidents build upon one another, each giving shape to the next until a sense of stability is reached. In a way, the final form is an accumulation and celebration of these unintended outcomes.
Recently, I’ve also begun integrating transformational processes into my installations—works that are designed to change over the course of the exhibition. For instance, in an alternate setup of ‘…into the peripheral, reflecting,’ a pool of clay gradually dries out during the exhibition, transforming from a muddy pool into a desert-like landscape. This evolving process becomes part of the work itself, reflecting its dynamic and impermanent nature.
Vera Kox: ‘…into the peripheral, reflecting,’ 2024, ceramic, engobe, glaze, steel beams, clay, water, dimensions
variable // © Christof Weber/Konschthal Esch, courtesy of the artist and Galleri Opdahl, Stavanger
DG: Can you say something about the textures on the folded ceramic works?
VK: Over the years, I’ve built a library of patterns—subtle structures often unnoticed but embedded in our daily lives, like the geometric pattern on the underside of a floor mat. These textures are thin layers of control designed to create a sense of safety and order in our daily environments.
Building on this, and as part of the shift we discussed earlier, I have for the first time incorporated plant imprints into these geometric textures. This came to me during a recent residency in Guadalajara, Mexico, where the highly polluted air heightened my awareness of the city’s greenery. I wanted to pay homage to its fragile vitality.
In the imagining of future fossils, ‘Sentient Soil’ also touches on ideas of extinction and preservation. Rusting steel rods as well as actual fossils I collected near a melting glacier in Spitsbergen are included in the aquariums displayed at Konschthal Esch. Over the course of the exhibition, the iron beams submerged in these aquariums dye the water and gradually alter parts of the ceramic sculptures, further emphasizing the dynamic and transformative processes at play.
Vera Kox: ‘] Instar [,’ 2023 // Copyright Bitmap/Markus Johansson
DG: You said you are shifting away from toxic materials, but are there other ways that climate change is affecting how you work? Thematically, for example?
VK: Climate change is an overarching issue of our time, and it inevitably influences my work. Some pieces address it more directly than others. ‘Sentient Soil,’ for instance, examines climatic extremes: the slow, irreversible melting of landscapes in Spitsbergen and the uninhabitable terrain of the Ethiopian desert. I aim to move beyond merely highlighting destruction, focusing instead on regeneration and resilience. Integrating live pioneering species like moss, which can endure and outlive us, offers a different perspective on life after destruction.
Vera Kox: ‘Sentient Soil,’ 2024, detail, glass, water, ceramic, glaze, steel, moss, gravel, fluorescein // © Christof Weber/Konschthal Esch, courtesy of the artist
DG: What about the pressure to make art that is archival, that can be stored in a museum and lasts forever? How do you deal with those demands as you embrace cycles of changeability in your practice?
VK: Well, ceramics, as a material, is incredibly durable—it can outlast stone, provided it doesn’t break. I’ve also been addressing this with more conceptual works that are instruction-based, for example, in the site-specific plaster puddles series ‘Persistent states, poached egg’ or the current set-up of the clay pool, which I would be curious to see in an outdoor setting. These pieces exist as a sort of “recipe” rather than a physical object when not on display, allowing them to be reactivated for exhibitions. Additionally, moving works outdoors, where they are exposed to wind, rain and various types of growth, integrates them into natural cycles rather than confining them to climatically controlled storage spaces. This approach redefines durability and preservation by embracing the changes and decay that all materials inevitably undergo.
Exhibition Info
Konschthal Esch
Vera Kox: ‘Sentient Soil’
Exhibition: Sept. 28, 2024–Jan. 19, 2025
konschthal.lu
29 Bd Prince Henri, 4280 Esch-sur-Alzette, Luxembourg, click here for map
